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月別アーカイブ: 2010年7月

Meidaimae Oakhouse

Okay, so after that big entry yesterday, it’s time to fill in the blanks! I think my brain has FINALLY cooled down enough. 😛

Here’s the entrance. You climb up some stairs and here it is, tucked away. Remember, this is directly above a bakery! A BAKERY. Wake up to delicious smells every morning, grab a treat, head off to work/school/play, buy a coffee, you are SET. Every morning.

Our staff was still getting furniture, dishes, and other miscellany into the house so it was sort of elegant chaos, but here’s part of the kitchen.

A quaint chalkboard to serve as a message area. Trust me, a chalkboard fits the mood of the house much more than a whiteboard would!

The stairs. This place has a real cabin-y, lodge-y feeling.

The bathroom feels homier than some other locations. Definitely a plus if that sort of thing is important to you!

The rooms are faintly Japanese style with hardwood floors. You can see lots of green out the windows.

Like this!

Two of our awesome coworkers, putting together beds and stuff.

Here’s how a room would look in a share situation.

Another view.

These closet doors are cool. It looks as though some of them were originally supposed to be used for the traditional Buddhist altars in a Japanese home. You can use them however you like, though! The closets, I mean.

Here’s some more bamboo. Awesome.

After wandering around, they’d set up a few rooms. Here’s the desk set-up.

So that’s Oakhouse Meidaimae. 6 singles and 1 women-only share room for 2. Pretty relaxing area, good access to Shinjuku and Shibuya.

Also, there’s a bakery on the 1st floor.

There is a bakery. On the 1st floor.

I think that’s all!

Did I mention the bakery on the 1st floor?

Eifukucho area

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Today I went and took a look at some of the surroundings by Meiji University, founded back in the 1880’s. It was so, so, so dreadfully hot and has been since the summer rainy season ended. I wish it would rain a bit longer! I ducked inside convenience stores and air-conditioned shops as much as I could and still wanted to melt. Still, the whole place had enough charm to keep the heat off my mind!

First, we looked around Eifukucho Station.

There’s construction being done around the entire Eifukucho Station area, but I was pretty impressed with what they’re doing with it. The scaffolding has artistic designs on it that also double as advertisements for the new building under construction, and the detour was lined with children’s art from local elementary schools. Even the worst ones are better than anything I could do!

Here is a fresh fruit and veggie stand near one of the exits, and also there are two of me in this picture and I hadn’t noticed at first.

The surrounding area is pretty well-stocked. Lots of restaurants, big drug stores, convenience stores… you’d have it pretty easy out this way.

This particular coffee house was really cute. The sole worker inside was a dapper older gentleman in a sharp bow-tie.

I really liked the lines this building created and how it utilized space with its arch designs and small bricks and zigzag metal staircase and… actually, I don’t know what I’m talking about. I just thought this looked cool.

Though I do not often find myself in need of buying flowers, I thoroughly enjoy walking by flower shops.

This machine says Hojicha, a type of tea, but I’m not really sure what it does. Oh well! Sort of looks like a giant shaved ice machine.

All of a sudden, we made a left turn and here was a large, quiet Inari Shrine. Shrines dedicated to Inari are all over Japan, and usually you see random tiny ones along the road peeking out from in between houses or buildings. I haven’t usually seen ones this big.

Inari is usually depicted as a fox.

Off to the side there are very small boxes of shrines dedicated to various figures for different purposes, like Sugawara no Michizane, patron saint of learning.

I hope I’m not boring you!

A building covered in Ivy. I wonder what the Japanese equivalent of the Ivy League would be? The Wisteria League? Cherry League? Haha, this is dumb, sorry.

…wait, I’ve got it! Kudzu League!

If I told you this nice example of traditionally-minded architecture from the 70’s offered lessons in something, what would you guess that would be? Tea ceremony? Calligraphy? Karate?

Answer: Tap Dance! (seriously)

The first floor of the building that the new Oakhouse is in has this bakery called Again, run by an NPO called Madoka. We were merely eying the menu and a woman cheerfully came out and invited us in!

They were making pound cakes at the time, and they explained to us all the different things they make and all the flavors they use. It was very, very pleasant.

Oh SNAP, chocolate chip madeleines fresh from the oven!

We definitely bought some stuff.

Seriously, if you come to live in this area, pay them a visit. You’d be living right above a bakery and I don’t know if I can stress just how cool that is.

After we checked out the house (I’ll show you in the next entry!), you come out of the neighborhood and upon this river.

Take a rest and sit on a snail shell or two, I guess!

A part of what I’m sure is a lovely winding nature path, and the back of our Chinese language correspondent!

Part of the Izumi campus.

So nice to be around all this green! I DO wish there were more trees in the city.

This building was impressive; would be more so if I could have fit the whole thing in the frame and gotten something else for scale.

View from the footbridge.

Okay, so now it’s lunch time! What to eat?
I found this Okinawan restaurant that looked good! …
…but alas, I’m not in the mood today–just had some soki soba two days before!

(That said, Okinawan food is seriously awesome and you should all try some now)

Aww yeah, Turkish kebabs! This place also seems to sell pizza and ice cream, which I will not complain about. But still: it’s extremely hot and need to be chilled from within!

Here’s a supermarket, at which I briefly considered buying and consuming an entire watermelon by myself before I saw that they were 700 yen.

There were some options in this wavy building, like a Wired cafe and an Italian place and I think there was one more? But I was on a budget today.

I eventually settled for some cold udon at a noodle shop nearby, which was pretty much 100% perfect at that moment. 😛

And here’s the station, and Alice again.

Pretty chill town! I’m sure it’s got areas tailored to be a college town but I have yet to discover them. I’ll try to when it cools down!

Next time: Oakhouse Meidaimae!

Kuramae Oakhouse

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Hey there sorry I couldn’t talk about the Kuramae house for the last
couple of weeks — things have been pretty hectic around here, and I
found myself having to go to Nagoya and Osaka on business.

Most
people come to Japan and just hang out in Tokyo or Kyoto, which is
arguably the best way to experience the best mix of new and old Japan if
you haven’t before. But Nagoya and Osaka are pretty cool too. Both have
castles, for one!

I don’t often have time to see the sights — just enough to do
the work and come back — but I DEFINITELY make it a priority to sample
the local delicacies!

In Osaka the okonomiyaki is famous, but I tend to go straight
for the takoyaki! I do this mostly because I’m saving room for eating in
Nagoya. 😉

In Nagoya, it’s a feast: pork cutlet with miso sauce; flat, udon
noodles called kishimen; and the famous Nagoya chicken wings.

Basically, food is awesome.

Okay, on to the house.

The
area surrounding Kuramae and the Asakusa area is laid out a bit more
logically than the rest of Tokyo, and the main streets are very wide.
The rooms are slightly cozy but with the surrounding area, I don’t think
I’d mind at all.

Another
room.

I
have no idea why but I totally dig that kind of window, haha.

A
slightly wider room. Some of the rooms had really cute curtains. Is
that okay for a guy to say? “cute curtains”. You know what, whatever, I
don’t care; those curtains were cute.

I
definitely wanted to run across this roof like a Japanese Spiderman.
Because I am 7 years old.

Electric
range in the kitchen with a fish grill. I started eating fish a lot
more since coming to Japan.

Slick
black refrigerator. I like the fact that the TV stand has drawers!

A
look down the hallway.

This
vanity is in the front part of the dormitory room. Oh dear, that’s me!

And
here’s the pleasant criss-crossing of wood that make up the dormitory
sleeping room.

So that’s that — a nice, quiet, and homey area that’s still
situated right in the midst of Tokyo.

My coworker just told me we’re going to check out another new place next
week, so look forward to that!